


The Taste of the Past

by AJ_Lenoire



Series: The Taste of Life [5]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Bucky Barnes Feels, Bucky Barnes Remembers, Bucky Doesn't Like The Cold, F/M, Humour, Mild Language, Panic Attacks, Sexual Humour, Slice of Life, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-07
Updated: 2016-12-07
Packaged: 2018-03-21 09:55:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,680
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3687855
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AJ_Lenoire/pseuds/AJ_Lenoire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When HYDRA dares to rear it's ugly heads again, the Avengers are the ones who step up to make things right. But with Thor, Iron Man and the Hulk all too conspicuous, it falls to an unlikely someone to help save the world, and join Earth's Mightiest Heroes. But will it all be too much?</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Taste of the Past

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, so, yeah, major backtrack, but after literally a year the inspiration had dried up and I didn't like how it was going and it was WAAY too angsty, so, you get this instead. Still pretty long, though, and I think I prefer the single-chapter-installment style anyway.

When they woke up the next morning, Natasha felt an oddly fuzzy sensation deep in her belly, somehow connected to the weight over her waist. She turned, and saw that it was James beside her, his arm thrown over her, hugging her towards him, head burrowing into the back of her neck. They were both fully clothed, it was chaste and respectable as possible, and yet her face burned with the excited embarrassment of debauchery and delighted shame. It was her James, after all, and yet not. It would be some time before the memories were entirely in sync, before he could sort through them and connect them all into one full consciousness. But still, she could see the similarities – especially now, when he slept. The foundations of the man she had loved was the brother Steve had grown up with; she had seen echoes of Bucky underneath the hard Soldier, and that was what had caused her to fall in love with her tutor all those years ago. In truth, his Bucky and her James were more similar than she’d first thought, and this gave her comfort in that it surely meant he could regain all his thoughts into one whole. To live two lives, either by choice or by force, was difficult and lonely. She could speak from experience on both parts, and so could he.

As if telling she was thinking, he stirred, and his eyes opened, and he blushed when he realised what was going on and how close they were.

“Good morning.” She smiled, turning over so she was facing him, and deciding not to move his hand on her waist, “How’re you feeling?”

“A little— _better than yesterday_.” He replied, then grimaced, “A little better than yesterday.” He said again, more forcefully, then he paused. “I think… I think I dreamt about something from the Room. I was me, but I remembered it.” He paused again, frowning slightly as he tried to hold onto the details of the dream, “Did… did I teach you how to assemble a rifle?”

“You did.” She smiled warmly, heartened that that was a sign – small but significant – that he was on the way to mending. It was ridiculous how much of an effect he could have on her, but she’d long since given up trying to staunch it. She had a small circle of those she 100% trusted, consisting only of Clint, Steve, Fury, Coulson, and Clint’s ever-increasing brood, now with TraitorBabyTM. Surely she could spare one more spot, and it seemed her emotions were giving her no choice. She disliked when they were being difficult; made her less focused, but it seemed such a thing was inevitable with the tidal wave of confusion that brown-eyed gaze brought. “Did you remember anything else?”

“Nothing particularly good.” He said in a low voice, heavy with the deeds of bad men. He had been their scalpel, mercilessly brandished on their slightest whims, and yet he held the guilt for something over which he had had no control. He was, like Steve, so incredibly good, that it was faintly annoying. Not nearly enough to outweigh her genuine love of him though.

 _Love_. She felt her face burn a little with the thought, but there was no point in twittering about when that was the word. Whether it was familial, romantic, or something else forged in fire and desperation, tempered with similar endurances, she couldn’t say. All she knew was that it _was_. How irritating.

“I remembered something else, too.” He added in a soft voice, and she turned back to him, interested by this unexpected addition. There was a long pause between them, but she could tell he was bursting to ask something, if hesitant about his right to ask it.

She smiled at him encouragingly, “Go ahead.” She implored,

He nodded, a little more relaxed now he had ‘permission’. “You know something.” He said.

“I know lots of things.” She replied offhandedly.

“About me." He specified, "I can tell. ...What did I do?”

If she weren't as highly trained as she was, she might have bitten her lip as she considered what to say; a clear sign that she was unsure how or if to phrase it. But he was as trained as she was, and recognised the tiniest signs that, in all reality, betrayed the same thing. Eventually she replied, “ _You_ didn’t do anything.”

“Technicalities.” He waved a hand dismissively, but stayed on point, “What did I do? I… I could almost remember, but I couldn’t.” His brow furrowed as he tried to grasp these memories, like wisps of thin smoke, “Something bad, something about you. I remember… I don’t know.” He looked at her almost helplessly, and she sighed; he was going to find out sooner or later, and so as she spoke, her voice was soft and frank.

“You shot me.”

“I...I...what?” His eyes were wide, nothing of the killer that had shot her remained; wiped away with time and caring from his old brother and his new friends. He was deadly; trained and precise, but he wasn’t _bad_. There was blood on his hands, yes, but no malice in his heart. “I-I’m sorry.” And that was the proof.

She smiled at him, for she had long ago forgiven him. It had not been his fault, and who is she to complain considering where they are? “Aw, c’mon.” she grinned, nudging his shoulder playfully, “What’s a bullet between friends?” she paused, “Well, two bullets, but that’s beside the point.”

He nodded, still preoccupied. “Do...” he began, then licked his lips because suddenly they were bone dry, and voice didn't quite work. He took a drink from the glass she'd left on the side, then tried again, “Did... Did it leave a scar?”

In reply, Natasha lifted up the hem of her shirt to bear a strip of skin about level with her navel. He gaped at the scar; so out of place on her smooth, solid stomach. She didn’t scar easily, for the serum in her veins usually healed her before there was time to scar. But it was his weapon, so of course she did. The KGB and HYDRA had plenty of practise on developing weapons that would scar even super-soldiers; he had been their lab rat for over fifty years, and he had the scars on both his body and mind to prove it.

He wanted to touch the scar, feel it under his fingers, but he stops himself because even as James, even as _her_ James, he no longer has that right. It must be earned back – if such a feat is possible – and she is not his to touch. Certainly not now.

Natasha let the shirt fall back into place after a moment, then stood up and stretched. She offered him her hand, “Come on,” she smiled, “The others’ll be wondering where we are. They might assume something uncouth.”

“Well,” he replied, taking the hand and hefting himself off the bed, an easy grin on his face, “We _did_ sleep together.” There were layers to that phrase that made it a joke and yet not. They had shared a bed the previous night as though they were children in a fairytale. In days, _years_ gone past, they had shared their beds as lovers; a fleeting glimpse of freedom and rebellion in their lives of crushing obedience and conformity. A lot had happened since those days – to both of them. But one thing, if nothing else, was sure. In some way or form, they would remain there for one another; lighthouses in the storm.

* * *

In the communal rooms of the Tower that morning, there was one man more than normal. Talking to Steve in a low and urgent voice, the Man Out Of Time only had a moment to mutter _hello_ s, _good morning_ s and _goodbye_ s before marching out of the room. Natasha’s expression hardened; she knew what that meant.

“Global crisis?” She asked the newcomer, none other than Agent Phil Coulson. He was as grim faced as she was, not even freaking out over Captain America.

“Not quite, but just as bad.” He replied, “Indigo flared up.” Natasha’s stomach twisted. _Indigo_ was the codename for a terrorist group they’d been tracking very recently, wanted for everything from jaywalking to attempted genocide. They’d been on SHIELD’s radar for years, almost caught until HYDRA had burst from the shadows and it became clear that they’d been _funding_ Indigo (which was actually a HYDRA division dedicated specifically to recreating Erskine’s serum) as part of a ploy to distract the heads of SHIELD from their own Nazi plans of world domination. “We got three hits, one in Vancouver, one in Konya, one in Tokyo. Me and my team are heading to Tokyo, Cap is going with a small STRIKE Team to Vancouver, you’re on Konya.”

“What time do we ship out?” She asked, already mentally going through her inventory of weapons, packing her bag.

“There’s already a plane waiting.” Was Coulson’s reply, “I want the three of you strapped in; wheels up in fifteen.”

“Three of us?” Natasha repeated, “Who’s coming with me and Clint?” The more pointed form of the question was who _needed_ to come? They were already two Avengers; agents of such skill that they merited ranking alongside the Hulk, Thor, even Captain America. They were a whole STRIKE team on their own.

“Iron Man, Thor and the Hulk are all too noticeable.” Coulson replied, “We need stealthy,” he looked at Bucky, who was standing behind Natasha, watching this exchange, “They say the Winter Soldier was a ghost story,” he remarked, “I think a ghost story is just what we need.” He turned to face Bucky full on, “Mr Barnes, I’m Director Coulson, Head of the new SHIELD. How’d you like to become an Avenger?”

Bucky blinked, “Really?” He asked, and Director Coulson nodded. Natasha was uneasy. Not because of James, but because Coulson needed such a specific and targeted skillset that he was bringing in an entirely untrained (in terms of SHIELD) operative on a highly sensitive mission. That, Natasha and Clint thought, was a sign of how desperate he was. This fact - though they were both easily trained enough not to show it, and didn’t - shook both of them to their cores. Natasha was relieved to have Clint standing right next to her at that moment. They were one another’s rocks. Allies, partners, best friends, even lovers when the occasion had suited them, and Clint had not yet met Laura. Natasha had told herself for so long that love was for children, until she’d meant Clint. Now she knew better; she knew she loved him. More profoundly and deeply than she ever could have if she were only his lover. Their bond was unique and unbreakable – it had taken the trickster god of chaos to attempt severing it and even then, he had not succeeded. Even with the desperate situation around them, with James bringing all this confusion _yet again_ (sometimes she really hated her feelings. Most of the time, actually. They wouldn’t stay in the same place long enough for her to think straight), she felt safe and secure and prepared with Clint Barton standing beside her. She didn’t even have to glance at him to know the feeling was entirely mutual.

“Really.” Coulson confirmed, and anyone who didn’t know him well would (mistakenly) think he was calm and cool as a cucumber. “You have a unique skillset, one that would be very useful in an operation like this. You’d be helping to save a lot of lives.” Natasha had to bite down on a smile; that was Coulson’s line to people like James and herself. Appeal to the atoner; recruiting worthy self-sacrificing candidates and weeding out the apathetic glory-whores in one fell swoop.

Bucky blinked again, thinking this over. There was a short pause, then, “I consider it an honour, sir. I’m at your service.” The Brooklyn in his voice was so prominent that, combined with the new haircut, Natasha could see for the first time _exactly_ why he’d been so popular in the forties. Hell, she’d be lying if she wasn’t a little turned on herself. But mostly she was happy for her friend. The Avengers Initiative had been the first real, solid proof that she was doing something good. And she knew from first-hand experience that something like that was the best form of therapy and atonement for someone like her.

Or James.

* * *

It was strange being in the uniform again.

Minus the goggles and eyeshadow, of course, he was in a new but very-similar uniform for his mission, consisting of a one-sleeved jacket, black pants and combat boots. It was entirely new and never worn, but the difference between these and his HYDRA uniform were so small it made him a little uneasy to see his reflection – though his shorter hair was something of a comfort, as was the subtle but distinct level of upkeep of said uniform. His old one had probably not been taken off more than a handful of times in the entirety of his seventy years as the KGB’s and HYDRA’s mindless slave. With his spending the majority of his time in cryofreeze, and their general lack of concern for his wellbeing, what was it to them if his uniform got a little tattered?

So there were solidly mixed feelings as he stood before the mirror, fastening the buckles that had been added to the shoulders. At the insistence of Director Coulson, he had had a harness for Steve’s shield added to his uniform – how anyone could think he was worthy to fight with such a thing was beyond him, but he hadn’t refused. Along with knives stuffed in multiple concealed pockets, and a holstered gun on his right thigh, he was ready to go. Ready to begin the long path to atonement.

When Natasha walked in, clad in the same suit she’d worn during the fall of SHIELD (was she aware he could tell? Was it a conscious decision to put him off? Or was it just coincidence?) but her hair was short and curly – the Red Room had ingrained into her the practicality of short hair; harder to grab in a fight. However, they had kept her hair long – most likely because many of her disguises involved long, flowing locks as one of the many features to entice her prey, and she would need to know how to fight even with that disadvantage.

They’d done that a lot, to the both of them. Put them at disadvantages to test them. He still had a scar on his inner thigh where they’d made him fight with a cracked femur. Damn near snapped it clean in two, but he’d won the fight. He remembered her scream when they’d made her do the same when she was fifteen, and the subsequent punishment she had had to endure for crying out. He also remembered that for his own ordeal, he’d earned a whole day’s rest outside of his cryo-tube. He shivered involuntarily at the thought of the half-coffin, half-prison, how they’d drench him in ice-cold water and flash-freeze him like a ham because he was just that; a piece of meat for their use and amusement.

“You alright, James?” Natasha asked, and when he looked at her, meeting her reflection’s eyes, he noticed that the upset and pain from earlier was gone – no, not gone. Pushed down. Compartmentalised. For the sake of the mission and Coulson and him and herself. That was how they both dealt with pain; pushed it down until it was a good time to deal with it. Such a time rarely arose, but even when it did, they often still ignored the pain. Look where it got them. They were cold and distanced by the standards of others, only themselves around those they trusted. Steve was the only common factor in that particular equation. He wanted them to be able to be themselves around one another, but he knew in part some of the horrors that he had subjected her to, both directly (such as his shooting her on two separate occasions) and indirectly (his being reduced to the KGB’s slave and ultimately breaking her heart), and he knew that it would be a while before they could work past all that. He envied Clint and his easy friendship with her; so calm and natural and _real_. She had that with Steve, too. _He_ had that with Steve. But they didn’t have it with one another. Not yet. Little did he know that she was desperately hoping that would change as much as he was.

But neither of them said anything of the sort. He gave a small smile, “Just nervous.” He replied. One of the few things _James_ and _Bucky_ agreed on is that he wanted to join the Avengers Initiative; save the world and try, in some small way, to atone for the many sins he had committed as HYDRA’s assassin. Not to mention, he would get to work alongside his two closest friends and allies. “Haven’t been on a mission like this since ’45.” He sighed, “I was a different man then.” He looked at his reflection. There was a depth and darkness to his eyes that had not been there all those years ago. A harshness to his face; the last wisps of youth and naivety worn away. And of course, the metal arm.

Natasha smiled and sauntered over to him, resting an elbow on his shoulder, crossing her legs, and cocking her head to the side; admiring his reflection. “I don’t know.” She said mildly, “You’ve changed, sure, but you’re the same man. I can see him.” She said lightly. She raised the hand that wasn’t braced on his shoulder and pointed with a smile to his face, almost a joke. “Right there. The smooth-talkin’ Howling Commando who followed Captain America into the jaws of death.” She grinned, and he grinned back,

“Naw.” He said, his accent becoming thicker, and her grin widened. His own became a slightly proud smirk as he continued, “I wasn’t following Captain America; hell no. I was following the little punk kid from Brooklyn who didn’t know when to back down from a fight.”

She gave a small laugh, “Sounds about right.” She said, “Steve talked about you a lot, you know. I almost felt like I knew you before I met you.” She smiled, “And from what I’m seeing, maybe you’re more whole than you thought. James is pretty similar to Bucky, from where I’m standing.” She punched him on the shoulder playfully, and he found himself returning her smile.

“Are they, though?” He asked, not intending to be cruel, only posing a question, “I don’t quite remember everything; it’s all still so jumbled, but I know there was a time when we told each other everything.” That was true, but what was also true was that they had been apart for so long, and had endured so much in that time. They did not have the easy, dangerous closeness of before, and he understood that, but even so, “I want to have that again, Natalia.” He wanted that trust, that unwavering alliance, like the one she had with Clint, and with Steve.

It was the first time he'd called her _Natalia_ whilst speaking English; as clear a sign as any that he was one mind and one soul – splintered and broken, but _one_ nonetheless. She forced herself not to blush; to hide any clue that this was a big deal to her. Emotions were difficult; unwieldy and unresponsive to rules, hence why she rarely, if ever, let hers show. Clint was the only one who saw her let her feelings roam on a regular basis, because she couldn’t help herself when she was with her brother and her sister-in-law and her niece and nephews. She never let them show anywhere else; rarely to Steve, and not to James since a half-century ago, near enough. But he had always done this to her, reduced her to a little girl, reminded her of a time when her thoughts and emotions were less tightly locked up, when her hands were untrained and unskilled in the arts of death and deception. He reminded her of a time when she had been almost innocent. Certainly, she hadn’t had blood on her hands, which was about as close to innocent as she’d ever been.

In light of his request, Natasha looked at him for a long moment, seeming to mull his words over. Then she smiled. “I’d like that, too.” She replied, leaning up to kiss his cheek lightly. A small gesture, in reality, something she did almost frequently with Clint and Steve (never often; she had never been overly liberal with affection and she wondered if it just wasn’t in her nature), “I’ll be honest, I was… hesitant at first. I wasn’t sure if you knew me, what you’d make of me.” She hadn’t been sure whether she could trust him, whether she could bear to trust him – not just with her heart but with her thoughts. To her it was as intimate as putting a blade in his hand and holding it to her throat. “But not just yet.” She added, almost regretful.

That, with mild annoyance, he understood.

“I’ll be your friend, your partner, whatever you want me to be.” She was flexible; the Room had made her that way, “But I think I should keep my distance until you… straighten everything out. You have more than enough thoughts inside your head without adding mine.” Because to them, sharing everything was sharing problems; fears and trauma. He wasn’t ready to bear that all again. It would be nothing short of cruel, “It wouldn’t be fair.”

“I know.” He replied softly, understanding, he dropped her gaze, “But we can still be friends, right?”

“Of course,” she smiled, “And once Banner says you’re all okay up here—” She tapped his temple lightly; an almost reverent brush of his skin, a movement that betrayed too much of her true feelings, and hinted at her wanting far more than he could offer right now; she suppressed a wince and hoped in vain that he hadn’t noticed, because he had trained her and who better to analyse her movements like that? “—I’ll be ready with drinks and a bucketful of inner thoughts and problems.”

“Just one?” He asked wryly, an amused curl to his lip. She found her mouth tugging in the same direction,

“It’s a big bucket.” She replied smoothly, and her smirk became a smile as she said, “Now, let’s go make you an Avenger.”

* * *

_Classified Location, Outside Konya, Turkey_

“Just once,” Clint growled irritably, “Just _once_ , I would like to go somewhere sunny.” They had been flown to a remote and only semi-functional airfield by a quinjet and told by the pilot – a small Asian woman (whom Clint knew by face if not name; ‘the Calvalry’ did not really count in his opinion, though he didn't want to ask Nat because he knew she'd already told him about a dozen times) that terrified James and Clint, but for whom she herself held nothing but respect (there were so few high-ranking female agents) – that their safehouse was eight miles’ walk through marsh, woodland and mountains. Every step was like pulling their lower legs out of half-dried cement, and though any one of them could normally walk eight miles with ease, the uneven terrain and extra effort of trekking through a foot of thick mud made it feel more like eighty. The seven hours of jetlag (it was still morning back in New York for god’s sake) didn’t aid their motivation, even if it meant they had more energy than the locals who were winding down for the day.

Natasha rolled her eyes, “It’s a mission, not a holiday.”

“ _You’re_ not the one who has to sit in ventilation shafts or debilitated buildings for hours on end.” He snarked back at her, “You’re living it up in dresses and functions and champagne, whilst _I_ freeze my ass off across the street, covering _yours_.” It was true he had spent many an hour lying as backup for his partner over the years, and to be honest, most of the time it had been nothing other than boring. Natasha usually got what she needed without interference. By the time SHIELD had trusted her enough to not need a handler anymore, a good half of her missions had been entirely solo (and so had many of his).

“Oh, _please_ ,” she rolled her eyes again, “You haven’t been my backup in _years_.” That was also true. In recent years they’d only been paired up for the big missions that usually involved travel to a military base or half-levelled city or the middle of a terrorist ring; the sort of missions that require heavy fire power, infallible aim and undetectable infiltration. Which basically meant he, too, was on the front line. Those sorts of missions guaranteed only two things – neither of which being safety or the promise of getting out alive – and those two things were: getting shot at, and a complete lack of even the remotest luxuries. Usually including heating and running water. _Those_ missions were not boring, though even several years later he wasn’t sure if that was a good thing. They were bloody and dangerous and more often than not ended with their pulling bullets out of and stitching up one another. But they were also exciting and empowering and vital to world security and more often than not ended with a tangle in the sheets – before Clint had gotten married, of course.

He scowled at her, “Maybe not,” he admitted grudgingly, “But it wouldn’t kill Coulson to send us to the Bahamas.”

“When there’s a threat to worldwide security in the Bahamas, I’m sure he will.” She said dryly, hefting her pack onto her shoulder – these things were made for men bigger and broader than her, and sure enough they _always_ slipped off her shoulders – and returning to the march with determination. She was eager to drop this deadweight and get a start on their mission, but the safehouse they were walking to hadn’t been used in years, meaning it would have no food, no medical supplies, and no change of clothing – civilian _or_ uniform. “Though, personally, I’d rather Hawaii. Nothing happens in Hawaii.”

Bucky lagged behind the pair as they chatted and nipped at one another, Clint with the GPS in his hand that lead them towards the safehouse, Natasha with her hand on her gun, ready to fire should a hostile emerge from the foliage around them. He felt out of place here; intruding on a friendship as old and strong and sure as his and Steve’s. Yet, it felt different. Clint and Natalia had a bond that was not necessarily more important or _better_ than his and Steve’s, but it was certainly different. Clint and Natalia had taken bullets for one another, and pulled them out, too. They had hugged one another through night terrors and shock-inducing injuries and the agonising purge of any number of drugs designed to slow them down or spill their secrets. They had washed away the blood and the grim whilst the other sat, catatonic and numb in a shower cubicle, brought then back to humanity with promises and trust and friendship and love. Not romantic, never romantic, even when they had slept together. There had never been anything remotely related to romance with those two. But it was deep and sure and unbreakable. And he was imposing on it.

Thus, he was mostly silent, focusing on trudging through the swamp and not tripping over any tree roots – not that he needed to. He had the same powers as Natasha; enhanced speed, strength, stamina, agility and lifespan. With his metal arm, he exceeded her in strength, and possibly even Steve. In short, he could have been walking with his eyes closed and probably not tripped. But it was something to focus on, and helped to marginally distract his attention from the conversation in front of him (another “gift” from the Red Room serum, enhanced senses).

“Yeah, but _nothing happens in Hawaii_. It’d be boring.”

“I, for one, would not mind two weeks of boring. Sun, sand, sea and _stillness_. Even on my days off I can’t get any peace. Between you, Stark and your family, I feel like a childminder.”

“Aw, c’mon. You know you love them really.” Clint grinned at her, “Stark may be terrified, but he likes you, and I know the kids _adore_ you. Barnes–” He looked behind himself and grinned, “Nat’s pretty cool, isn’t she?”

Natasha groaned and muttered something in Russian that Clint couldn’t understand and Bucky couldn’t make out. But he managed a grin that was actually sincere as he replied, “She’s alright, I guess.” Which caused Natasha to roll her eyes again.

“Next time, I’m staying home with Stark. You two are _insufferable_.”

Clint barked a laugh, “But you love us.” He grinned, throwing an arm around her shoulder. She gave him a flat look, but after a few moments she smiled at him and he laughed triumphantly. Bucky smiled, but he had a feeling he would not be able to coax such a reaction from her with such ease. That sort of trust from Natalia took years to build up, years he had not had. The Red Room had connected them in many ways, but not really in friendship. Not when she had to be prepared to snap her would-be sisters’ necks, and had the threat of elimination hanging above her head if she made the wrong move. Their relationship had been based on a mutual strive for survival; a right of tooth and nail. She’d never had that with Clint – or if she had, being on SHIELD threat watch, it had been significantly lesser – and the friendship, whilst he understood it had come slowly, had been built strongly and maintained dutifully. They trusted one another with their very lives. It would be a long time before he got that sort of trust with her again; he needed that sort of trust with himself first.

Still, the promise of a drink and a bucket gave him hope. Not just that he might reconnect with the only person he knew (and probably cared to remember) from that time in his life, but also the idea that eventually, he’d be okay again. Or, as okay as he could be. But then, Natasha seemed to be doing pretty well for herself, with a makeshift family and a team of staunch allies.

* * *

When they finally arrived at the safehouse, they were pleasantly surprised by its condition; every wall, floor and ceiling was intact – you couldn’t even see the metal foundations under the wood panelling and plasterboard and drywall – and the taps were functioning. The water was even _clean_. There were two double beds in the single bedroom, so that meant someone was on the couch. Clint nominated himself for that position (Natasha had to wonder if his ulterior motive had something to do with her and James being alone in a bedroom or the fact that he would have easier access to the kitchen in the middle of the night. After a short thought she decided on the latter) and the pair of ex-SHIELD agents then got down to setting up the equipment and prepping for the mission. Though, in all honesty, this was merely a formality, and with any luck they’d be back in the US before tomorrow (in the New York time zone, at least). Both Natasha and Clint were looking forward to trudging into his farmhouse in the wee hours, collapsing in exhausted heaps on the living room couches, and being woken up by children bouncing on them and asking to look at their drawings. Natasha felt a smile tug at the corners of her mouth. There were few things in her life that made her smile as much as Laura and those kids.

Coulson had extended the offer to join his new HYDRA-free SHIELD to both of them. So far, neither of them had taken it, instead following Steve’s example and only coming in for the heavy-duty missions that required Avengers-level power, or STRIKE Team Delta skill. They were still unsure if they would take the offer. Clint had his family to think about; a steady income was beneficial, but Stark had more money than he knew what to do with, and in return for his being safely housed there (along with the other Avengers) during the “Sovokia fiasco”, he had promised them as much money as they needed for whatever they needed. That, at least, made the choice easier for him, but there was still a part ingrained inside both of them that was hesitant to be so reliant on someone other than each other.

Prepping for the mission was an almost therapeutic process for Clint and Natasha; cleaning out guns and checking weapons and testing the various types of proofed clothing they’d been supplied with (bullet, fire, radiation and so on). Bucky himself found some familiarity in the process, and almost a sense of calm as he, too, cleaned out his guns and checked them. When they were all satisfied with their weaponry, they went over the plan.

“So Nat, you’re coming in here with the fake ID.” Natasha held up the invitation that open of Coulson’s tech wizards (Agent Fitzsimmons, she was pretty sure) had mocked up for her, registered under the name of one of her many new covers: _Nadia Reine_ , an (unmarried) heiress with an interest in many questionable enterprises. “Bucky, you’re on backup up top, and I’m on infiltration whilst you two keep an eye on Brutovitch.”

Yuri Brutovitch was their target. A man with the access codes and the money and the _power_ to give HYDRA the boost it needed. Currently, Brutovitch was supposedly developing a super serum from the dregs of what they had managed to procure from the Red Room under the pretence of making a new HYDRA equivalent to Captain America. Bucky had been the closest thing to that equivalent until recently, but he had not been trained for the purpose of fighting Captain America as the world had deemed him dead. Now the research into Erksine’s serum was booted up for a second time, and with things like the Centipede program and Extremis, recreating at least a similar serum was becoming a likely – and dangerous – possibility. Coulson and his team had had a hand in shutting down the main suppliers for the Centipede program, and Stark had taken care of Extremis (as well as finding a way to stabilise it, which was both good and bad news) but Brutovitch had managed to get his grimy hands on both, and was close to perfecting a formula. They three of them had been sent to find out _exactly_ what he knew and _exactly_ how far he was going, and he was a private man to say the least. This was the first time in three years that he was going to be actually out in the open, and they could _not_ afford to screw this up; hence three Avengers being called in (well, two and a trainee).

“And if Yuri catches on?” Bucky asked. Natasha gave him a dangerous smile; the sort of smile she’d give an enemy agent right before beating him. In many cases it was probably the last smile a man had seen. Over the years she had reclaimed the Widow; owned the Widow instead of the Widow owning her, but she was no les formidable for it, or any less terrifying. Even James, who’d practically _taught_ her how to smile like that, was unnerved by the sight.

“You’ve forgotten how good I am if you think that’s a possibility, James.” She told him. He supposed that was true; it had been fifty years, give or take, since their last mission together, and even without the mind-wipes that he was overcoming, those memories would likely have been fuzzy. But he did still remember how he looked at her sometimes and didn’t see her, didn’t see anyone he knew. He had trained her how to don and discard entire personalities as easily as the clothes she wore, but some of it came down to simple talent. He was equally trained in all these skills – hence why he was also on watch duty and not infiltration like Clint – but he could not say he had this same talent. Part of her he could not have claimed to give – no one could. Part of her, from the moment she had been born, when Ivan Petrovich had watched over her instead of the many apathetic faces of Red Room, had been _destined_ to become the Black Widow.

As he thought of this, he supposed Natalia had probably been too young then to accurately remember Petrovich now. That was something not even the Red Room could give back to her. Petrovich, who had caught her from a burning hospital and decided to take her under his wing. The closest thing she had had to a father, until the Red Room had sunk its claws into her. He had met the man on a few occasions, but not Natalia until she had been seven years old.

Sometimes that fact made him a little uneasy; how she had been a child when they first met, and now he thought of her as he did now; sultry and beautiful and a million other things that he would never think of in a child. But then he remembered that she had lived longer than he had. He had spent many years simply gathering dust in a frozen pod. She had _lived_ those fifty years he’d mostly spent frozen. She had seen more and lived more. And now, when he was 98 and she was 75, these numbers seemed insignificant. He had watched her as though in fast forward, meeting her as a seven-year-old, yes, but merely days later as a nine year old, and then only once a week for but a few hours. Barely six months had passed for him when he was then looking at her at seventeen. And now they both looked in their late twenties. It’s these thoughts that push the others away. He loved her as a child; as one _should_ love a child. He had grown fond of this little girl with her fire and her talent, he had grown to love the woman that she had become, for her fire and her beauty.

And he trusted entirely her ability to fool Yuri Brutovitch into selling his secrets away.

* * *

_Konya, Turkey_

“My _god_ , people actually work in these?” Clint’s voice sounded choked over the comm unit in Natasha’s ear. She resisted the urge to roll her eyes, and instead kept a pretty smile on her face, learning the room before she moved in on Brutovitch. High above, on the wide balcony of the large ballroom, James was strutting around with a champagne glass in one hand and a nanosleeve covering the other (no prizes as to guessing which one). He was mostly providing cover, watching from above as Clint normally would, making sure no one had found her out (no one ever did; not unless she wanted them to). The only reason Clint was on data-mining and not backup was because James had more skill with disguising himself as another person. Clint had always been better at blending into the shadows than into another personality.

And right now, he was complaining about his disguise. Just to be safe, they’d knocked out a hotel employee, stuffed him in a broom cupboard, and stolen his uniform for Clint to wear. It was a tad on the small side, and already tight-collared, with a stiff white shirt, black bow tie, black trousers and patent-leather shoes like black mirrors.

“Yes, and they do it without whining like children.” Natasha replied in a murmur, watching in case anyone saw her talking to herself. No one did. “And we agreed, Hawkeye, radio silence unless and until something goes wrong.”

“Roger that, Widow.” Clint replied moodily. When she’d first joined SHIELD, she’d been the one breaking rules, but only just enough. Just enough to make the mission more exciting, more dangerous, and never enough to threaten it. Over the years they’d rubbed off on each other. She had become more respectful of rules other than the Room’s, and he had become a little less stiff about missions, realising they were almost fun, if you let them be. When Clint had been benched after New York – part of a six-month-recovery program after Loki playing with his head, it had also been fortunately timed, as Captain America had graciously agreed to be on-call for SHIELD, and needed someone to teach the soldier to be a spy. What better than A) the best spy in the world and B) someone he already knew and trusted? Once again, she had found a dual rub-off effect, in that she had become a little stiffer (it didn’t help he’d been in the goddamn US military) and he had become a little laxer. But that wasn’t the only reason she was a little tense.

It was the first mission in over half a century where James was her backup.

She’d honestly forgotten what that felt like. Not to say that having Clint as her backup was any less... well, _any less_. They had a friendship, and he was _the first person_ she had completely and totally trusted – including James. In the Red Room, such complete trust was a death sentence. Frankly there was no one she would rather have at her back than Clint, except maybe Steve. Ideally both. But James, he was familiar and foreign all at once, and that scared her a little. She’d never thought she’d be in this position again. She could feel his eyes tracking her, and she still wasn’t entirely sure what to feel sometimes when it came to him. She wasn’t sure that would ever change, either. There was love, but there was grief. There was joy and there was anger. And so much confusion. In her head and in his, and between themselves. But there _was_ trust, now. She did trust him. Of that, at least, she was sure.

And for that reason, she pushed the tension away. She could do this. She had Clint and James at her back. Two thirds of those she trusted. Two of her closest friends and allies. So it was with almost _ease_ that she narrowed her vision to the mission objective. Seduce Yuri. Get his voice and fingerprints to open his suite upstairs. If necessary, kill him. She has to find out just how much of his formula he had memorised; otherwise the data-mining would be ultimately pointless. An image popped into her head suddenly; her sat on the desk of his suite, laughing at his unfunny jokes and giving light, teasing but skilfully tailored questions; quizzing him on his knowledge. No doubt she’d probably end up doing something similar to that, because SHIELD – or at least, Coulson’s new, HYDRA-free SHIELD, didn’t condone the use of truth-serums. They were still half in science-fiction; and all the versions SHIELD had developed were highly volatile and damaging to the subject.

No matter, she hadn’t needed truth-serums in the past.

Her concentration broke as she was reading the room. She was sizing up a dark-haired man next to Brutovitch when she heard James grunt in her ear. She was trained enough to not jump or

startle, but it still surprised her.

“Soldier?” Clint’s voice followed the grunt, and she realised it was James.

“Is something wrong?” She asked,

“No. I’m good.” Bucky muttered, and it was followed by another grunt, “Just shoulder pains. I get them sometimes.” The two Avengers understood that. The files on the Winter Soldier stated that the bionic replacement of Bucky’s left arm weighed something around 50 pounds. Bucky himself only weighed 190 (according to his military files, which had included the weight of his real arm), and even with the extensions built into his muscles and bones, even with the stump of his shoulder – roughly half of his upper arm – acting as a crux for the metal replacement, the weight of the limb put incredible stress on his muscles. Steve had noted once, in passing, that Bucky had always walked with a big of a strut, even in the 40’s, but that it had become a lot more pronounced nowadays. She hadn’t had the heart to tell him that it was because of the metal; the weight of it physically pulling him down. In all honesty, she probably wouldn’t have needed to. Between Steve’s enhanced senses and her being his mission partner for a year, he was as perceptive as she was. Almost.

“Okay, but if this is gonna be a problem, you’ve gotta say now.” Came Clint’s voice in her ear, and she would have nodded along if not for the fact that she was in the field. “This is one mission that can’t be compromised, Soldier.”

“Understood, Hawkeye.” Bucky replied, “But I can handle it. It’s like a pulled muscle, I’ll be okay.” Natasha half had a mind to point out to Clint that he was lying; she could always tell and she knew he knew she could tell. But she was willing to give James the benefit of the doubt. If he said he could handle it, he could handle it. That part wasn’t the lie; the lie was that it was a shoulder pain. But part of their Red Room training had been compartmentalisation; learning to deal with pain. Learning to push it down so far you forgot it was there. So she held her tongue and let herself trust his judgement.

And she turned back to Brutovitch. He was a portly man in his early fifties, beady-eyed with large, circular spectacles and silver-streaked black hair. He was a quiet, private man. Skittish and paranoid – though for good reason, she supposed. He was the sort of man who did what he did because it fascinated him, not because he wanted the money. He wanted to see if his formula, if his serum, could _work_. And it was her job to make sure no one ever learned the answer.

There was a younger man next to him; mid-to-late thirties, with a shock of dark brown hair and grey eyes. He was tall and slender and much… _hungrier_ than Brutovitch. He was Brutovitch’s business partner, Dmitri Volotov. Volotov was in it for the formula, too, but also for the money. And the fame. And the _power_. Poking out of the collar of his black shirt (who wore all-black suits these days? And without ties, too? He looked like an undertaker) was the top of a tattoo. It was not a large enough section for her to be able to make it out, however.

“Okay, Widow.” Came Clint’s voice in her ear, “I’m in position, any time you’re ready.” Coulson’s tech team had supplied them with a contour-mapper. In essence, if she shook someone’s hand whilst wearing one end of the mapper, and Clint placed his hand on Brutovitch’s room’s palm-scanner whilst wearing the other end, he would be granted access, as it would read as Brutovitch’s palm. She also needed him to state his name, but that was just to get into his room. No doubt she’d need more to get into his laptop, which mean she had to keep him in the palm of her hand until Clint had what they needed.

“Roger, Hawkeye, approaching the mark now.” She murmured back, and glided over to Brutovitch with a large smile and a purposeful demeanour. If he was reserved, then she needed to blatant and obvious. In the silvery dress she was wearing, she was like a wraith through the ballroom, glittering in the candlelight from the chandelier high above them. Bucky wondered what she would have looked like in the moonlight wearing that dress – of course, he’d have to keep guessing, because the ballroom had no windows. Another reason why Clint wasn’t on backup duty, because the Hawk was always _way_ back, usually across the street or something.

“ _Good evening, gentlemen_.” The Turkish flowed from Natasha’s mouth like silk, and for good measure she said it with a radiant smile. Volotov looked at her steadily, Brutovitch with some nervousness. She smirked inwardly, this was going to be fun. She’d forgotten how much fun playing marks was.

“ _Madam_.” They replied respectfully, inclining their heads. She could feel a slight sizzle of tension, one that hadn’t been there before. They were discussing work, and she’d interrupted.

“ _Forgive me my intrusion_ ,” she continued, extending her hand; gloved in silver silk. Brutovitch took her hand and kissed it, and she smiled internally as well as externally. She had his fingerprints, now all she needed what his name. “ _But I simply_ had _to come over and introduce myself. I’m rather a fan of your research_.” Their research in the same line as Extremis and Erksine and the Red Room. Into human improvement. But not all of their research had been for militaristic purposes. They’d had to start somewhere, “ _Your work in gene splicing is truly incredible. Thanks to you, my darling brother is still alive_.” Her cover had been given a younger brother; only fifteen years old, and nothing special. But it added validity to have a family.

“ _I am honoured you think so, Madam…?_ ” Volotov asked, ending the phrase in a question,

“ _Reine_.” She replied smoothly, “ _Nadine Reine. Though, I’m terribly sorry, your name escapes me, Mr Bruvich?_ ”

“ _Brutovitch_.” Came the correction, but Natasha could have sworn then and there. Volotov had said it! But she swallowed the frustration and nodded with a smile.

“ _Mr Brutovitch – and Mr Volotov. I owe you gentelemen both a great debt._ ”

“ _Please, you owe us nothing, Madam Reine._ ” Volotov smiled, “ _But please, call me Dmitri_.”

“ _And Yuri_.” Brutovitch added, for all the good that was worth. Clint needed a last name, and he needed it within the next sixty seconds, before the contour-mapper on his hand reset to default, and she’d have to shake Brutovitch’s hand again.

Then, the Winter Soldier came to her rescue.

“ _Dmitri!_ ” Out of seemingly nowhere, James appeared, loud and jovial and seemingly inept at playing marks. She actually had to surpress a grimace, because he was being so… _obvious_. She liked covert and private; a small number of people and an even smaller space. Half the room could probably hear _James_.

Volotov looked at James as though he didn’t understand – and he probably didn’t. “ _May I… help you?_ ” He asked, his smile clearly forced. Bucky laughed and threw an arm around his shoulder, imitating being drunk,

“ _Don’t you remember me, Dmitri? It’s Alexei! From Grovingrad!_ ” Natasha wasn’t sure if she wanted to slap him or kiss him for that one. Grovingrad was the stuffy little private school Volotov had attended, no doubt meeting any number of Russian rich boys in the process. It was unlikely he would remember them all, and judging from his reaction to Bucky’s comment, he didn’t.

“ _Ah, yes… Alexei…_ ” He murmured, looking uncomfortable, “ _My mistake, you look different. How are you?_ ” He clearly wanted ‘Alexei’ gone, but was too polite or too nervous about blowing a cover to say it. Either way, Bucky managed to steer him tactfully towards the bar (at the other end of the room) whilst loudly proclaiming he would tell Volotov _exactly_ how he was doing over a drink.

“He may be out of practice,” Came Clint’s amused murmur in her ear, “But he’s good. Now get

Brutovitch’s name. Fifteen seconds.”

 _I know_. She thought, _trust me, I know_. So she turned back to Brutovitch with an embarrassed smile,

“ _Ah, boys and their school friends_.” She said dismissively, “ _I suppose you cannot blame them._

 _Tell me, Mr Borovitch, did you—_ ”

“ _Brutovitch_.” He corrected offhandedly, and she heard the relieved sigh of Clint in her ear, matching exactly her own internal one. She had _really_ forgotten how much fun this was.

“ _Ah, my apologies once more. Names are not, it seems, my gift_.” She lamented. He nodded in understanding, and they kept up idle chatter about banal events for the next few minutes as Clint rifled through his computer and set about hacking into his files. She stole glances at James every now and then, watching him talk Volotov’s ear off at the bar, very cleverly not giving him even a _chance_ to make an escape.

Then she heard Clint swear roughly. She couldn’t ask what, because Brutovitch was still talking to her (and _boy_ did he get chatty when someone got him talking about his work) but after a moment, he was answering her – and no doubt James’ – unasked question.

“Only half of the formula is on here, guys.” He said, “The other half must be on Volotov’s computer.”

“ _Will you excuse me for just a minute, Yuri?_ ” Natasha then asked, and, though perhaps a little surprised at the sudden change of pace from the lovely Nadine Reine, he nodded, and she walked over to the bar slowly, muttering low and fast into Clint’s and Bucky’s ears.

“Okay, Soldier, you and me swap. Let me work mark two and we’ll get his specs. Hawkeye, position yourself outside his room. Good news is, mark one doesn’t have the formula on memory. He knows the basic outline but nothing finite. Soldier, keep mark one _away_ from two. Don’t need an interruption, but don’t let him go up to his room. Talk to him about work and you should be fine, ask him about _Dmitri_.” That would most likely work; asking about his old school friend to said friend’s colleague, lamenting that a pretty girl had stolen his friend’s attention. It would work. Hopefully.

Thankfully, it did. Roughly five minutes later, that was that. In and out and not nearly as difficult as Coulson had made it out to be – though maybe that was due to the political sensitivity of the thing. Coulson had made a point for the main bulk of his new SHIELD to avoid situations of this particular nature, as the world did not trust SHIELD, and most of it thought SHIELD was gone. But, nonetheless, they had the formula for Brutovitch and Volotov’s serum in the palms of their hands, and it was clear that whilst both men were clever enough to have the serum on file, they were not nearly clever enough to have it in their heads.

“I have to say, that went pretty well.” Clint remarked as they walked into the safehouse. Natasha groaned appreciatively as she pulled off her high heels, relishing in throwing them across the room.

“Of course it went well, by your standards.” She rolled her eyes, “Nothing blew up.”

Bucky raised an eyebrow, “So what’s _bad_ by your standards?” He asked, not sure if he wanted to know the answer. The pair looked at one another for a moment, then at Bucky, and replied in unison,

“Budapest.”

From the expressions on their faces, Bucky decided not to press the matter and ask what had happened there. Instead, he found himself feeling rather proud that his first SHIELD-related mission had occurred without any threat to global well-being. One could argue that that was rather a low bar, but where STRIKE Team Delta were concerned (could they really be called that when they were the only STRIKE Team left? The only ones that had not been HYDRA?) it was actually rather a large achievement. Over their shared STRIKE career, Natasha and Clint had seen themselves crash on a pacific island, set adrift in the North Atlantic, lost in the Atacama, stranded in the Himalayas, trekking through the Amazon, held captive by no less than seventeen different terrorist organisations, captured deliberately by fourteen, tortured by eleven, and shot more times than either of them cared to remember.

Needless to say, when they said things were bad, they were _very_ bad.

But, luckily, this was not one of those times, and they trudged back up to the safehouse with all the necessary data on a flashdrive in Clint’s breast pocket. Frankly, the biggest concern on any of their minds when they arrived back at the safehouse was when the extraction plane was going to arrive, and when they could get back to their respective lives.

* * *

_Classified Location, Outside Konya, Turkey_

“SHIELD 3-6-5, this is STRIKE Delta requesting extraction, do you copy? Over.” Natasha was sat, crosslegged, in the middle of the living room of the safehouse, a large radio transmitter sitting where a coffee table might have done. In one hand she held the radio receiver, the other holding a pair of headphones up to her ears (unless she was piloting a jet and needed both hands free, she didn’t like wearing them), and Clint was lying on the sofa with a laptop, rifling through the flashdrive’s data with relatively little interest; SHIELD’s tech team would dismantle it upon return. Bucky was also sat on the sofa, watching the pair of them with mild interest, but ultimately with a sense of uselessness.

“STRIKE Delta, this is SHIELD 3-6-5,” Came the voice of the little Asian woman who’d dropped them off at the airfield. “Confirm copy. We regret to say that extraction is not possible at this time. Looks like you’re gonna be spending the night. Over.”

From his seat on the sofa, Clint jumped up, “ _What?_ ” He exclaimed, “But I promised—” He cut himself off before he said something damning; mentioned his family. He broke off in a harsh curse and punched the wall. It reverberated with a metallic _clang_ and only served to make him gasp and fall to his knees, clutching his fist. He’d forgotten how solid the walls were; strong enough to cage even the Hulk.

“Is there a problem, 3-6-5?” Natasha asked, regarding Clint with mild concern, “Are we made? Over.” She watched Clint fume with a wash of pity and a matched irritation. He had been hoping to get back to Laura and the kids tonight. She had rather been hoping that, too; she hadn’t seen them in ages, and, despite his traitorous nature, was looking forward to spending some time with Nathaniel Pietro Barton. Her voice was trim and slightly cold as she spoke into the receiver.

“Negative, Delta.” Came the reply, equally clipped, but that seemed to be the woman’s natural demeanour. “SHIELD has to remain a covert operation; I think we can both agree that a SHIELD bird the same night as a government function could be seen as suspicious.” That was true. SHIELD was still technically dead to the world, and on a mission as politically sensitive, with such an important package, it was best to stay well within the confines of _safe_.

Or, as safe as a mission that required the Winter Soldier, the Black Widow and Hawkeye to complete it could be. “Confirm extraction for tomorrow?” Natasha then asked, keeping the hopefulness out of her tone, because she was the Widow right now, and the Widow did not feel. Agent Romanoff, on the other hand, felt like punching a wall, too.

“Affirmative. Timestamp to follow, but evening’s most likely.” Clint glared at the receiver and looked like he wanted to throw something out of frustration, somehow he managed to keep himself together, “3-6-5 out.”

“Roger, STRIKE Delta out.” Natasha replied, outwardly calm, but internally something between irritated and angry – then again, she usually was. She didn’t realise until then how much she’d been looking forward to a nice, normal, _quiet_ weekend at ‘Barton Farm’ (as she called it) surrounded by the closest thing she’d ever had to a family – hell, it _was_ her family. She was ‘Auntie Nat’ to those kids, Laura called her a sister-in-law, and she hadn’t seen them in months because of Ultron and Sovokia and Avengers 2.0 and now James.

Not that it was a burden, but she was starting to pine for her family, and now she’d have to wait another day to see them. She could only imagine how Clint felt; another night away from home. If his current demeanour was anything to go by, he was somewhere between furious and mournful. Thankfully, his mood brightened considerably when, roughly ten minutes later, there was a burst of static from the radio receiver, followed by Coulson’s voice. “STRIKE Delta, this is SHIELD 3-6-5, do you copy? Over.”

Natasha dove for the receiver. If Coulson himself was on the other end of the line, then it was unlikely anything good. “Confirmed, 3-6-5, this is STRIKE Delta. What’s the problem? Over.”

“No problem, Delta.” Coulson replied, and Natasha visibly relaxed. Out of the corner of her eye, Clint did, too. “Just letting you know that we set up a scramble a half-mile north of your coordinates. You have one hour. SHIELD 3-6-5 out.” The line went dead. Clint heaved a sigh of relief and vaulted over the back of the couch, grabbing for his uniform jacket and pulling it on so hastily he almost busted the zipper. Now he was alight with an almost feverish energy; one that he’d been exuding right up until their extraction had been moved to tomorrow. It was still not quite as – for lack of a better term – potent as it was before, but she smiled at his improved mood. Plus, a moody Clint was _not_ the ideal roommate.

Bucky watched Clint with as much confusion as Natasha watched with fondness. “What’s going?” He asked to neither of them in particular. “What’s a scrambler?” Clint looked up at him with a grin.

“Informal term for blocked mobile tower.” Clint replied, “SHIELD can temporarily block tracking signals. I can phone home.” Having pulled on his jacket, he grabbed his gun and stuffed it into a holster on his thigh; just to be safe. “Back in an hour.” He said, going for the door

“Say hi from me.” Nat smiled. Clint nodded, “And take your comm. unit.” She added as an afterthought. With the air of grabbing ones key’s from a bowl by the front door, Clint pulled out his regular hearing aids in favour of ones installed with comm. units before finally dashing out of the door, pulling out of his pocket what everyone at SHIELD called a scram-tracker because they couldn’t be bothered to remember the name, and following it’s signal to where he could phone home and apologise profusely to his wife. Natasha laughed a little as she watched him, but the sound half-died in her throat when she realised she and James were now completely alone.

The silence reigned for about three minutes before Bucky stood up and stretched, “Well,” he said lightly, “I’m going for a shower.” And he showed himself out of the room with relatively little awkwardness.

The shower in the safehouse was, at best, functional. It had taps and a showerhead and whilst it was situated in a bathtub, Bucky sincerely doubted that anyone had sat down and had a bath in this. Even someone like him, who’d spent time in the slums of WWII, spent decades in the uncaring clutches of HYDRA, had to grimace at the mottled porcelain and wonder if a shower was really the best option. But he really wanted a shower, and once he’d rinsed the tub down, it looked less questionable. The lock on the bathroom door, he realised, was insubstantial; the sort that had a tiny bolt to slide across, but a well-placed shove would send it flying open. He wondered if he should be worried about Natasha coming in, but it wasn’t like there’d be anything he hadn’t seen before. Sexual endeavours aside, they’d stitched one another up almost as much as she and Clint had. Still, the idea that she might be able to walk in on him showering was… peculiar. He wasn’t sure how to feel about it, but was relatively sure he hoped she didn’t.

His thoughts turned to the previous night as he scrubbed the layer of dirt off of his skin. A bitter argument turned into… well, turned into _that._ He still wasn’t sure what to make of it. Natalia was still so hesitant; she was still so worried that to love someone was to destroy them, that her love was no better than that of a real black widow spider, and that it would get her loved ones killed.

But he was willing to wait. He could wait for her, as she had for him. The girl he’d known in the Room – such a long time ago; truly another lifetime – she had been rigid but surprisingly open about love. In the years since then Natalia had swapped around; becoming freer in every other aspect, but clamming up when it came to her own feelings, lest she hurt someone else.

That was perhaps, he decided, why she loved Barton’s family so fiercely. She would never have a family of her own (though he was relatively confident that she did not want kids, even if she could have them) and so she loved through them. Because she could love Clint and Laura and the children safely; they were beyond the reach of her deadly affection. But in her mind, to love someone like she had loved him in the Room was to damn them and to doom them utterly. She resigned herself to platonic love – not to say that it was any less profound; he had seen how her eyes lit up when talking to Clint of his wife and children – because she did not trust herself to love someone romantically, for fear she would destroy them. Or worse.

He thought of his own fears, then. The nightmares that choked him every night, that burned his throat and plagued his mind. Crushing guilt as he slowly regained the memories he had of his time as the Soldier; realistically less than a year of his own time, crammed together so there was barely space to breathe between one murder hunt and the next. A flash of cold and then suddenly he was in another place, another time, with another death on his hands. He wondered if Natalia was still, after all this time, haunted by her deeds, and how she managed to bear them. How she managed to let the pain go – _if_ she had managed to let the pain go. But he was too scared to ask, in case her answer was _no_. He didn’t think he could take the rest of his life, waking in panicked sweats several times each night, metal hand gouging into the mattress, fisted in terror, strangled cries, _screams_ , stuck in his throat, coming out as pitiful whimpers. But he couldn’t tell Steve, he _wouldn’t_. This was his pain alone to bear, and try as Steve might he couldn’t know what plagued his brother’s mind. No one who hadn’t experienced the same terror could help him. So he would curl up in a ball in the middle of his bed, mutter mantras to himself; _I’m with you ‘til the end of the line_ , reminding himself that he was safe here, he was okay here. But that made little difference when the monsters in his head only laughed.

He hadn’t realised he’d been scrubbing so hard until he winced; his metal hand having taken off the top layer of skin on his right inner forearm, the soap stinging the tender skin underneath. He grimaced and fisted both of his hands by his sides, bowing his head and breathing deeply. _You’re a good man, Buck_. Came Steve’s voice in his head, _you’re not what HYDRA made you, just like Nat isn’t what the Red Room made her. You’re more than their soldier, you’re my friend. You’re a good man._

 _No, not really_. He thought.

 _Stop whining. You worry too much._ He decided harshly. These ‘conversations’ inside of his head had dropped to calming infrequency in the past few weeks; his psyche mostly mended. The only ‘usual’ voices inside of his head were the demons of his nightmares when he slept; throwing chains of guilt around him and choking him with them. _We have seen good men and bad men before. To know guilt is to know you have done something wrong. Trust me, you are a better man than most._ James was many things, but he didn’t believe in kind lies; rather the harsh truths. In the Red Room, everything had been lies upon lies, it was only natural that the personality he’d grown there, in the pit where lies and evil were synonymous, would find the truth refreshing and prefer it. It was odd how the voice he’d once despised was now almost comforting.

And then he was drowning.

* * *

Natasha had been sat in the safehouse’s main room, filtering through the files on the USB drive that Clint had left open to go speak to his family. The radio receiver was still sat in the middle of the floor, for now silent, as she was sat, crosslegged on the sofa as though she was just a regular teenaged girl scrolling through a blogsite – though with considerably more concern on her face as she realised _just how close_ Brutovitch and Volotov had come to recreating the Red Room’s serum; which in turn was not too far off Erksine’s; the last dangerous step. She had been engrossed in the chemical formulas; the basic trials of rudimentary versions, all dead or destroyed by the serum or their experimenters. She had been absorbed and horrified by what she’d been reading; to the point that, when she heard a strangled cry and a _CRASH_ , she actually jumped. Standing, she turned sharply to face the direction the noise had come from; the bathroom.

“James?” She called, vaguely concerned, “Are you alright?” There was no answer.

The higher part of her mind knew it was probably nothing; she could still hear the water of the shower running, he likely hadn’t heard her. But she had long since learned to trust her gut, and grabbed her pistol, holding it by her side, ready to aim and fire at less than a moment’s notice. She tried the door of the bathroom with her hand, and it didn’t budge. She knocked lightly, “James?” She called again, but still no answer. Not even a mutter. She frowned and pushed at the door. She’d seen the lock earlier, it was pathetic.

“If you can hear me, stand back.” She called. Again there was no answer, but she wasn’t expecting one by this point. Nausea pooled in her stomach, made her feel ill and worried. She took a step back and kicked the door. Once, hard, and in the right place. It blasted open with considerably less resistance than any of the walls in the house, and she raised her gun, ready to fire on adversaries that she soon realised weren’t there. No one was there. In a way, not even James was there.

In her shock, the grip she had on her pistol slackened, and it fell to the floor with an empty clatter. Natasha rushed over to the bathtub, kneeling beside it, half frozen from confusion and fear and shock. Bucky was lying in the foetal position, brown eyes wide and terrified, seemingly oblivious to the water running over him. He was murmuring, and she only caught the muttered ends of words – English, she reckoned, but it was hard to tell, he was so quiet, and trembling all over. There were parallel gouges in the tiled wall, where his metal hand had flung out to find purchase on the slippery, damp surface, the shower curtain was ripped from the metal hooks and was now simply a heap of white plastic in the corner, and he was gasping as though he couldn't breathe, in the full and complete hold of an anxiety attack.

“Please… Don’t…” He mumbled, and his eyes were wide with terror. They were fixated on some seemingly infinite point, not seeing her, not even seeing the white porcelain right in front of him.

“James,” she said quietly, brow furrowed. “What’s wrong?”

“Don’t!” He moaned, “Please! Not again! Don’t put me in there!” He curled up tighter. It was from fear, not cold, but still she reached for the faucets. Her hands shook as she clumsily reached for the taps, moved to turn them off. Her fingers slipped on the plush fabric when she grabbed for one of the threadbare towels and covered him in a feeble attempt to warm him up. He looked pitiful; curled up in a ball, rocking slightly, trembling. She rubbed his shoulder, trying to put some warmth back into his freezing skin, but he barely seemed to notice her touch – or _her_.

“James,” she murmured, “James, you’re alright.” She rubbed at his skin a little harder, trying to make him notice her. His skin was so cold, no thanks to the water, and it was like touching stone rather than flesh, save for his trembling. —No, not trembling, he was shivering, inexplicably, and she realised with a jolt that the pipes in this old house must have given out, because the water was freezing cold.

_The water was freezing cold._

_Ice cold._

With a horrible lurch of her stomach she understood what was going on, and a small cry escaped her lips. “James…” She whispered, “James, listen to me. You’re safe. You’re _safe_.” But he didn’t seem to hear her. He was shaking his head and shuddering and it was like she wasn’t even _there_.

“So cold…” He murmured, “ ** _NO!_** ” He suddenly yelled, “ ** _NOT WITHOUT YOU!_** ” He lashed out, metal hand grabbing the lip of the tub and cracking the porcelain like the shell of an egg, and he slipped back to knock his head on the bottom of the tub. He froze again, “No, please, I don’t — _what did you do to my arm?_ ” It was almost a scream; he suddenly flinched away from her touch, but when he looked at her, terrified, it was clear he didn’t see _her_. “Don’t put me in there, please! I’ll be good! Just don’t put me in there!” He clutched at his head like he thought it was going to explode, curling up even tighter, shaking his head as though there was some terrible noise only he could hear, shuddering all over like he was disgusted and freezing. He was lost in the spiralling maze of his own head, tumbling down memories of horror and bloodshed.

“No, no, no…” He moaned, “Don’t take them, please. Don’t take them. Steve, Becky, Mom… **_NO_** –– ** _!_** ” He broke off into a heart-wrenching yell that chilled her blood. With another awful lurch she realised that he was reliving past memories – that much was apparent – and he was reliving having his mind torn apart; having HYDRA and the KGB dig into his skull and rip out his memories, his _self_ and reduce him to their tool. And she was helpless to watch.

Her words, her hand on his shoulder, they were all useless; he was trapped entirely in a prison of his own haunted past. She knew what it was like; she had been privy to her own tortures, too many to count, and to this. Countless times, one wrong step, word, _situation_ had sent her spiralling into terror and madness, and only in recent years had she finally been able to break free of those clutches, and managed to stay afloat of the tide of pain that strived to drag her down and drown her like James was drowning now. There were few worse things, in her mind, than to be pulled back into a place of such darkness and terror that it could overwhelm you entirely. If not for Clint, she may well have never come out of those terrors; his arms around her in the darkness, slowly coaxing her back to reality.

And she owed James far too much not to at least try to do the same here.

She willed her hands still as she tried again to pull him from his slip, wrapping her arms around his bicep and pulling him upright, so he was sat in the tub, leaning against the opposite side, facing her but not looking at her. He was still huddled in a ball, but he was pliant, and she was reminded (god it made her heart ache to do so) of how he had been a compliant vegetable after coming out of the Block, who flinched when she made too sudden a move. She wrapped the towel around him again and managed to get him standing, but he leant so heavily on her that she almost fell over from the shock of it. But she had the same serum in her body as he did. He may have weighed over 200 pounds with his metal arm, but she could bench press 500 if she tried. He was still muttering, leaning against her and barely staying upright. He was shaking from cold and fear as she led him out of the bathroom and to the couch, Bucky obeying silently, still half trapped in the nightmare inside of his head.

“No…” He murmured, and he seemed to have sunk deeper into the illusion; less of himself leaking through into the real world, “No, don’t put me in there… Don’t… Please…” As she sat him down, he rested his elbows on his knees, shuddering, and pressed his hands to his ears. He was so confused, he could well crush his own skull with his metal hand.

“James.” She said again, kneeling in front of him, wrapping her hands around his wrists and prying them away from his head. He was complacent, even his left hand coming away, and he sat limply, back bowed, in nothing but a towel thrown over his shoulders, shaking, head bowed, gasping for breath. “ _James_.” She said again, tilting his head up, forcing him to look at her, eyes desperately searching his face for any sign that he was aware what was going on.

His brow furrowed slightly, and his gaze cleared, “Natalia?” He asked in a whisper, “Natalia… don’t let them hurt me. Don’t let them put me in there again…” He was still only half in reality, but his hands gripped her wrists tightly; a lifeline, and he was looking at her with vulnerable fear. “Don’t let them put me in there, Natalia.” He begged her, “ _Please_.”

She nodded, throat burning with scared tears, “Of course, James.” She told him, “I won’t let them hurt you, okay? You hear me? They’re not going to hurt you. I won’t let them.”

He nodded; carefully, fearfully, but part of him seemed to relax. They sat there for what felt like hours, him sat limply on the sofa, his hands tight around her wrists, her kneeling before him, hands braced on his face, thumbs stroking his cheeks and murmuring promises she knew she would keep; promises she would _die_ to keep.

“I’m not going to let them hurt you, James.” She said, her voice fierce and firm, “Never. I won’t let them. You’re safe here, you’re safe.” _You’re safe_. Somewhere the words reverberated inside of his mind. Suddenly she was standing there; on that metal scaffolding that was falling apart, Steve stranded on the other side, surrounded by fire. She was there. Outside the cryotube, prying it open and helping him out. She was there. Holding him as the terror; the tide that was dragging him down, ebbed. As he broke the surface of reality once more, and breathed.

“Natasha?” His voice was a whisper. She was still staring at him, _willing_ him to stay with her.

“Yeah?” She asked, her voice equally quiet. He swallowed,

“I… I’m scared.” He said in a small voice. She offered him the smallest of smiles; watery and hesitant.

“I know, James.” She replied, “But that’s okay. I’m here for you. I’m gonna keep you safe. Just like Steve. We’re gonna keep you safe.” His hands were still wrapped tightly around her wrists, but now he released them, and silently she was relieved, because the circulation in her right hand had started to become weak, and her fingers were going numb. But she did not move, she stayed stroking his face until his breathing had slowed again, until his gaze was completely clear, and his eyes were tracking her. Until he was back. “I’m gonna get you some clothes, okay?” She said in a hushed voice. He nodded and let her stand up; and she came back a few moments later and helped him get dressed; held him upright when his legs threatened to give out from underneath him, pulled on his shirt when his arms seemed not to obey him, and then she sat, carding her fingers through his drying hair, his head in her lap as he lay on the sofa, her legs as his pillow. It was an oddly soothing motion; calming the both of them, and laying a soft layer of gentleness over the room, allowing them both some small moment of levity.

They must have both been exhausted, because they were both asleep when Clint came back, barely an hour after he left. Asleep on the sofa, Natasha with her legs stretched out before her, and Bucky curled up in a ball, head still pillowed on her lap, hand thrown over her knees as though hugging her close. Clint said nothing; not intending to wake either of them. He only dragged a blanket over Bucky’s curled up body, tucked a second around Nat’s shoulders, and headed into the room, not wanting to disturb his friends from a rare moment of peace.


End file.
